What’s Crawling Around in Your Home’s Air Ducts?

You don’t want to think about it, but occasionally dust isn’t all that is in your duct system. You may hear animal noises coming from air ducts and notice you have unwanted visitors. You can try and lure the critters out but if they’re nesting they may not leave their babies. Call BW/Cook Service Experts for a complete duct cleaning and we will confirm your duct system is free of all these uninvited house guests, including: 

Bugs and Insects 

Nothing is worse than trying to kill a spider and watching it run into an air vent. You can’t get to it now and all you can do is sit in your room and imagine the spider laying all those spider babies. You may even think you hear some scurrying around your duct system. Don’t worry. BW/Cook Service Experts will come out and give you a thorough duct cleaning and make sure that spider and any of her bug friends are good and gone. Babies, too. 

Rodents 

When rodents make their way into your duct system, usually through holes in the duct work and cracks in the foundation or home exterior, it causes multiple issues. First, squirrels, mice, or raccoons can leave droppings behind and can destroy anything they come across, including Christmas decorations or baby toys you’re storing in your attic. Second, those little guys tend to chew, which can cause exposed wiring. That mixed with the dried grass and leaves they’re likely carrying in to manufacture a nest, and now you have quite the fire hazard in your duct system, your attic, or behind your walls. A professional duct cleaning can remove rodent droppings or nests, but you may also need to call animal control to remove the rodents and possibly an electrician if there has been any damage to wiring. 

Birds 

Birds usually look for safe and dry places to nest, like your air vents. Nests mean babies, which means they are feeding babies, and that means BUGS. If you have birds in your vents, you’ll likely end up with bugs in your home. But that’s not the worst part. Birds construct nests in your vents, and given the great amount of materials they use to construct said nest, it can wind up completely clogging a vent, preventing any airflow. As with rodents, a full duct cleaning from BW/Cook Service Experts can remove any droppings, feathers, or other potential illness-carrying leave-behinds. You might also need animal control to actually remove the birds from your vents or attics. 

Mice in Air Ducts 

If there are mice in your air ducts, you should take steps quickly to remove them. Mice chew through wiring and leave droppings like most rodents, but they also multiply quickly. And when they run around in the ducts, treating it like the highway of your home, they eventually die in the ducts. This creates an unsanitary situation, and you may notice an unsavory odor. 
 
You may suspect mice due to the noise you hear – lots of scratching and scrabbling along ductwork. Or you might actually spot one making an escape through the vents in your home. You might even confirm their presence by inspecting the ducts for mice droppings. Either way, if you suspect mice you have a couple options. You may trap them yourself, by placing traps just inside each duct and checking them in the morning. Or you could hire a pest control company. 
 
Once you’ve determined that the mice are removed, you should have your ductwork professionally cleaned by an HVAC company. If mice have been present, they will have left feces in your ducts. Mice droppings are toxic, and if you leave them in your ducts they can make you sick. BW/Cook Service Experts offers duct cleaning services that will remove most debris from your home’s airways. 

Call BW/Cook Service Experts today or schedule online for a full duct cleaning to help make sure the air you and your loved ones are breathing is healthy and pest-free.